


A Moment

by jawsandbones



Category: Mass Effect, Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Dialogue, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-13
Updated: 2018-02-13
Packaged: 2019-03-17 15:19:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13661733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jawsandbones/pseuds/jawsandbones
Summary: A moment between Shepard and Vakarian, before the final push.There’s thunder in the distance, met by the answering scream of the Reapers. The guns are a near constant, the fire and flash, cannons in a mid-level apartment. The road must be cleared for their advance and so they wait. There’s rubble on the bed, and the glass of the picture frame is cracked. Someone she doesn’t know smiles at her, a child in their arms. Shepard places the frame back onto the nightstand, and her boots track mud across the rug. Half the building is blown off, but the curtains still stand, waving like a flag of surrender into the street.





	A Moment

There’s thunder in the distance, met by the answering scream of the Reapers. The guns are a near constant, the fire and flash, cannons in a mid-level apartment. The road must be cleared for their advance and so they wait. There’s rubble on the bed, and the glass of the picture frame is cracked. Someone she doesn’t know smiles at her, a child in their arms. Shepard places the frame back onto the nightstand, and her boots track mud across the rug. Half the building is blown off, but the curtains still stand, waving like a flag of surrender into the street.

She kicks a rock out of her way, ducks underneath crumbling plaster. The piano sits almost untouched, unscathed, and beautiful even despite the stain on its side. She sits at the stool before it, opens the lid for the keys. Some spider crawls away, its home disturbed, but she pays it no mind. Shephard presses the buttons on one of her gauntlets, feels it come loose. Bare hands touch against the keys, black over white, and they are cool underneath her skin.

The first press is lost underneath the noise of the gun, the scream, and she turns to watch the flashes against the night sky. Muzzled light that streaks across like shooting stars, the rumble of a god-like creature walking through the streets. More buttons and two gauntlets now rest on the lid. Taking proper position, sitting with her back straight. Brushing hair behind her ear before she places her hand. Her movements are stuttered, a bit rusty, but she falls into the rhythm and makes music only she can hear.

He puts a hand on her shoulder. “Sounds nice,” he says and she smiles. Not quite as alone as she thought, then. She laughs as he bumps her over so Garrus can sit beside her. “Found this downstairs.” Her helmet rests with a heavy _thunk_ beside her gauntlets. He’s pulling off his own, adding it to the collection of armor. The piano is not quite so unscathed anymore. Shepard’s fingers linger on the keys, press softly, focusing on the music and not the chaos so close to them.

“You didn’t have to come with me,” she says, “it’s probably safer with the others.”

“And let the great Commander Shepard hog all the glory? Let someone else have a turn,” he tells her, “when I get back to Palaven, they’ll be lining the streets shouting my name.” Raising his arms in the air as she laughs, pretending to wave to his adoring crowd. “Vakarian! Vakarian! _Rahhhh_!” Laughter lost in the whine of the Reaper’s path, the sudden burst of light that cuts across the horizon. The cheer lessens as they watch it. It fades and the noise fades with it, but still they watch the silence for a few moments more. Her hands drop away from the piano.

“Is that what you want? All those turian women tripping over themselves to give the great Archangel some attention?” She crosses her arms and leans forward, resting on the piano, looking at him with a smug smile.

“I only want attention from one woman,” he says as he puts a hand on her back, slipping around her waist. He leans forward as well, comforting weight on her back, his head over hers. That light again, the cacophony of noise and answering thunder. She had thought of showing him London once. The preserved castles, that chocolate shop she knows he’d love. She’d thought of showing him lots of places. She wonders if the rest of Earth is like this, buried under rubble.

“So are you going to play for me?” He asks as he moves away from her, as he puts his hands on the keys. Tapping roughly, earning him loud bangs that cannot be counted as music in the slightest. She bats his hands away, placing her fingers in the form she once knew so well. The music comes easy, a song she thinks she learned when she was very young. All of that is far away now, some distant memory that it almost seems like it belongs to another person. Some different Shepard.

The Reaper screams, the guns answer. A rhythm that’s too familiar now, but it’s being drowned out. Focusing on the music, the way her hands flutter over the keys. Garrus is bending towards her, tapping his head against the side of hers. Studying her as she plays, the brilliance of her even in this din. She is all the color of the world, the sound and feel, all he needs to feel at home. As long as it’s with her, he’s comfortable anywhere.

“Commander Shepard.” The words cut through the music, through every thought. She looks over her shoulder to the soldier standing in the ruined doorway. “We’re ready for you,” he says, saluting her before he leaves. She closes the lid, keys disappearing in the dark once again. Reaching for her gauntlets as she stands, the familiar feel of them around her hands and wrists. Garrus as his helmet under his arm as he waits for her.

She reaches up, pulls him down by his breastplate. A kiss against face, and they stay like that for a few moments. He lets the helmet fall to the floor as he wraps his arms around her, holds her close. She still smells like the Normandy, with the edges of smoke. She’s clinging to him desperately, and it’s not close enough. They pull apart reluctantly. He passes her the helmet, and she passes him his.

“Vakarian,” she says.

“Shepard,” he answers. Picking up their rifles, heading out into the street for the final push.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! You can find me [@jawsandbones](http://jawsandbones.tumblr.com/)


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